


Snowfall

by charade



Category: Tokyo Ghoul
Genre: Gen, M/M, Underage Drinking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-16
Updated: 2018-04-16
Packaged: 2019-04-23 16:38:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 712
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14336661
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/charade/pseuds/charade
Summary: A quiet snapshot from the past. Snowfall in the 4th ward, a light grey like Renji’s hair, like Renji’s eyes.





	Snowfall

Everything about Yomo is pale. His hair, his eyes, even his skin. Sometimes Uta feels like he covers himself in tattoos just for contrast, just for Renji. His black clothes, black sunglasses, black hair, black heart. A yin and yang, the two of them. Renji can be his little spot of purity, the lotus blossom sticking out from all his mud. He’d give Renji a little bit of his darkness if he could, because all those walls Renji’s built up around himself are so fragile and that light he seems to radiate shows you where all the cracks in him are.

Sometimes he thinks he wears all these piercings so he can reflect just a little of that light. To catch it and hold it just long enough to create a spark. It’s like he’s constantly trying to light a fire inside himself by being around people with enough light to magnify into a flame. He’s trying to catch even a flicker of it, it seems, and it hurts, sometimes, to watch Renji try to snuff himself out, to smother that brilliant blaze by sealing off any path to the outside.

The first time he and Itori got Renji drunk it was snowing in the 4th ward, the smog of the city mingling with the flat wet clusters of flakes as they came down, turning everything the color of Renji’s hair. They hadn’t intended to get him drunk, of course, just a little booze to warm them up or pass the time, either one. There were no fights to break up, no squabbles to manage. There rarely were on nights like these. Even ghouls weren’t immune to the effects of snowfall.

His kotatsu back then was small, meant only for him, and Itori was hogging most of it. Renji was wrapped in that same grey coat he’d keep wearing for years, or something just like it, though back then it was big on him, large enough to wrap his knees in. He’d barely had a sip of the blood wine Itori had open before he had fallen over into Uta.

Maybe he should have taken the bottle away from him then, but they were young, and Renji was new and exciting and oh so warm, and the thought of having him stay like that, so close, so open, was too much to resist. It always had been. He and Itori listen to Yomo start babbling, and its all the two of them could do not to giggle. They’d never heard him talk so much. After a minute, he’s said more words than he had since they’d known him. Uta had always thought, before, that every word he had managed to coax out of this stoic man was some kind of precious gem. He’s surprised, then, that after several minutes of Renji going on about nothing, they don’t feel any less precious.

The three of them kept passing the bottle around as Renji recounted the plot of his favorite manga series, with increasing enthusiasm and decreasing clarity. Uta listened, more to Renji’s voice than the words, and he soon realized he wouldn’t have been able to repeat back much of any of it. But it didn’t seem to matter at the time. He could feel Renji’s chest vibrating, feel the warmth that radiated out from him. Outside the window, the snow kept falling, grey like Renji’s hair, like Renji’s eyes, up against a backdrop of dirty orange. It had been like they’d all been removed from everything, from their lives, from this world, just for the night.

Eventually, Renji had stopped talking, though Uta couldn’t have said when. They’d finished off the bottle and Itori had buried herself nearly up to her hairline under the skirt of the kotatsu. He could have gone to bed, but once he did that, this night would end. Whatever magic had woven its way through this room would disperse and the world outside would come back to life. In the morning it’d all just be slush spinning off car wheels and being kicked off wet boots and who knew when he’d get to feel Renji this close to him again. He took a deep breath and let it out. It left the faintest impression in the air.

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this like two years ago and always hoped I'd get inspired to do more with it but more never happened. So, while Ishida is confirming my long held headcanons, I figured I'd share this.


End file.
